An Angel's Voice
by N.C. Wolfe
Summary: The bear, the fire and an Angel. The story of Emmetts struggle through the change. My entry in the 'Missing Moments' One-Shot Contest...


**Contest: The Single Shot Awards**

**Category: Missing Moments **

**Title: An Angel's Voice **

**Pen name: N.C. Wolfe **

**Pairing: Emmett/Rosalie **

**Rating: T **

**Disclaimer: I do not own any part of S.M.'s brilliant world of the Twilight saga. This is simply my take on the what could have beens. **

**Summary: **

**The bear, the fire and an Angel. The story of Emmett's struggle through the change. My entry in the 'Missing Moments' One-Shot Contest...**

**A.N. **

**Hey All! This is my entry for the 'Missing Moments' one shot contest. And has just been nominated for the Single Shot Awards *Squeels!* Hope y'all enjoy! **

**Emmett's POV **

I stood in the midst of the forest frustrated, looking around myself at the completely haphazard mess of shrubs and vines for the strip of red cloth that I had left tied to the branch. I loved to hike, to explore the open wilderness and take it all in. The sights, smells and just the feeling of being completely and totally free. I craved the limitless bounds it offered me. It gave me a sense of wild excitement that I lacked sorely in my everyday life. It was my favorite of all pastimes, but now as I searched for the marker I had left for myself that would help me back out into the real world, I felt almost trapped. I had never let myself be this careless before...

And I wouldn't have if I hadn't seen that mother bear standing out in the clearing as she watched her cubs play. Being the over excited fool I was, I couldn't resist getting closer for a better look and stupidly I'd left my senses behind me and had wandered off of my well marked trail. I must admit it was worth it. Being so close and watching those gigantic, gorgeous animals in all their magnificent glory was a thrill unlike any I had ever experienced out here on the trails. If only I would have just thought for a moment in my hurry to at least break a few branches and bend them to point my way back, I wouldn't be out here hunting around for scraps like an idiot.

I needed to get back home. Mama was waiting there for me and I didn't want to see the disappointed look she would have on her face after having spent weeks slaving over jar after jar of strawberry jam, only to be too late getting them to the judging table at the county fair. My mother prized the fact that she had won first place on her jams three years running and it wasn't something she would take kindly to, having that honor taken away from her just because I wasn't back soon enough to get her there.

My Daddy had passed away five years before and Mama had relied on me since then, as I was now the man of the house, to look after her and my younger sisters. I knew she was plenty capable of doing most things on her own, she was the strongest woman I knew but I felt as though after everything she had been through in her thirty five years, that she more than deserved to be taken care of. My father had treated her like she was his angel and there was no way I'd ever be the cause of her feeling any less than that.

I looked up when I saw a tree, wrapped tightly with vines, that looked vaguely familiar and then whooped loudly when I noticed just beyond that a bright red cloth striped across a hanging limb. I'd be back in time to take Mama to the fairgrounds just before the judging started! She'd still be a little sore at me for not getting her there in time to gossip with the other woman and for them to put on their bragging faces but at least I wasn't going to let her down.

I walked quickly to the limb, almost running in relief, then paused when I heard a shuffling sound coming from behind me. I turned around and searched with my eyes when the movement through the bushes grew louder and closer to where I stood. This was not good...Damn the inane curiosity that had kept me there waiting to see what it was. I should have run. Why hadn't I run? But it was too late now as I stood there staring with wide terrified eyes right into the gaze of the biggest grizzly I had ever seen.

I tried in that moment, knowing that running now when it was this close would be useless, to think of what little information I had gained in my life about what to do when confronted by a bear but my brain had decided to cease function just when I had needed it the most. What the hell was the matter with me? And why was this damn bear just standing there looking at me like it was trying to figure me out? So what did I do? Well this is me, so of course I'd do the stupidest thing I could think of, and waving my arms around like a mad man I screamed at him to get out of there. I shooed the bear. He didn't seem to like that too much.

I watched, my eyes growing wider now with the fear that was beginning to overwhelm me, as he stood up to his full height which must have been 10 feet or more and let out a feral growl that had me quivering in my boots and ready to wet my pants. I knew at that moment there was no longer any hope, and I cringed thinking once again about my poor mother who's face I would never again see as it filled with pride over her next blue ribbon.

She had lost too much already in her short life. First my baby brother who had died just hours after his early birth and then my father, who had been the light that lit up her eyes, passed only seven months later while being crushed under the caved in mine. And now here I stood, the only man, the only protector left in her life and she was going to lose me too. Who would keep her safe? who would take care of her and the twins, Jolene and Amelia who had just celebrated their tenth birthday last month? They needed me but my stupidity had finally caught up with me and I had done the one thing I said I would never do. I had let them down.

I felt the anger at what I was putting them through begin to build up inside, white hot and blurring my senses. It may be my end, the bear may put me down, but I wasn't going anywhere without a fight. I lifted my head and standing straighter than I ever had, I glared the monster in his frenzied eyes, matching his angry stare with the heat of my own and with a guttural yell I charged full force into his massive bulk.

I felt the force of his strike and the searing pain shoot through me as the bear swiped me across my back and flung me into the tree but I refused to give in to him and scream, I refused to show him my fear. I got up and with as much force as I could still manage crashed back into him as he once again hit me, his razor sharp claws tearing at my skin and knocking me to the ground. I couldn't give in, I had to keep pushing, I had to show him I would take what he had to give and give him as much as I could in return.

I attempted to stand again, my head spinning dizzily, foggily, but before I could get to my feet I felt another crushing blow hit my head and I fell for the last time. I vaguely noticed as the bear went flying off of me but I heard that voice, like bells in a symphony, and I saw that face, an angel more beautiful than the clearest spring day, before at last my world went black.

I was dead. I knew I was. Nothing as impossibly, inhumanly beautiful as that angel could ever exist anywhere outside of heaven. But should I hurt in heaven? I still felt the tares that the bear had made in my skin as they stung with a now almost numbing pain. Heaven should bring me peace, that's what I had been taught. I felt myself being lifted off the ground and wondered if maybe I hadn't made it quite yet, and the angel had come to take me there. Surely once I had reached it the pain would leave.

I felt the wind whip at my open flesh as I flew through the air for what seemed like hours before I finally landed gently on the soft cushioning surface that must be a cloud but the pain was still there. I reassured myself it would be over soon...And then I felt a touch, ice cold and hard as stone, caress my face. It must be almost over, I am almost there. The touch was tender. Almost loving. I wanted to ask it what was happening to me but my lips wouldn't move. It was almost over. Suddenly I heard the words that would not escape my lips build in my mind as I felt the razor slice through my torn skin. And then came the fire...

I felt the scream growing in me, pleading to escape, fighting against the flames, licking white hot and spreading deeper and deeper into my skin, my flesh, my veins, to my core and I heard it tear through me. The sound, the horrible shrieking cry that left my lips, I did not recognize as my own. It was primal, agonizing and animalistic as it ripped from my throat and shook my soul. This was not heaven. Only hell could bring this much raging, burning fury. But the angel...Satan had stole me from her. He had saw my stupidity and deemed me unfit to be taken home in her arms.

I felt the flames grow stronger, more fierce by the second, their burning strokes turning to sharp cutting slaps as I attempted to claw at where they struck. How long would I lay here and burn? It felt like hours, days of agonizing fire. Only the pits of hell could hold such an inferno as this. A never ending blaze that should by now, have consumed me fully. How could there be anything left of me but ash? This should not be possible, this terror, this pain but I knew this was my fate. Forever. Eternal damnation.

The blaze began to move, further and further into my core, burning whiter, hotter, sharper into my heart. I cried out again for someone to help me but I knew that no one would. Satan showed no mercy. My screams were in vain. I began to thrash about, attempting to redirect the path of the fire, but to no avail. My heart, sensing the danger that were the flames, began to pound itself furiously in it's cage as if attempting to escape it's fate. Faster and faster it pulsed, like the virtually invisible vibrations of a hummingbirds wings. I struck at my chest, ripping, clawing, trying to tear this fiend from inside me. I could no longer distinguish the individual beats of my heart as the fire burned impossibly hotter. And then just as I thought I would explode with the insanity that was calling me, tempting me, my heart ticked it's last beat. The fire had won.

The pain was gone. I must be no more...But how could I think this thought if I were gone. Could ashes think? Could they feel? Could they see the brightness streaming in beneath their eyelids? Eyelids... Ashes did not have eyes. If I were finished how could I smell the glorious, fragrant flowers that sat beside where I lay? I felt my fingers move when I told them to, my legs, my toes. But there was no pain. How was that possible?

I heard a voice call out to me, telling me that everything would be alright now. It was beautiful, a symphony of bells, my angel! Was it her who had brought me back from the fire? I listened with reverence as she continued to speak, her words like the most glorious song. She was singing to me, telling me to open my eyes. I could never deny that voice. She owned me. My heart, my soul, my all belonged to that voice.

I felt my lids flutter open and I took in a breath, a breath that strangely, I felt did not belong to me, as with new eyes I took in the most breathtaking sight I had ever witnessed. How was such beauty possible? Golden locks flowed, cascading down, framing the stunningly angelic porcelain face that was now smiling at me with perfect red lips and a crystal gaze that took my breath away and with that, nothing else mattered, not the bear or the fire, nothing but her. She was everything. And as she reached down and took my hand in hers I knew, I wasn't sure how but without a doubt I knew that I was home. She was home. I whispered to her with a new voice,

"I am yours"

A sonnet rang out

"And I am yours"

**A.N. **

**Thank you all for reading, and please go easy on me guys, this is my first one shot and it wasn't as easy as I thought it would be to get everything I needed to, out in one chapter...But hope y'all liked it! Please R&R and tell me what you thought!**

**To see all the stories that are a part of this contest please visit: **

**www .fanfiction-challenges. blogspot. Com **

**2****nd**** A.N.**

**Hey guys! Just wanted to let y'all know that An Angel's Voice has been nominated for another award! Sooo excited! And to whoever it was that nominated my story I LOVE YOU! LOL…Anyway, here's the website (Just take out the spaces)**

**www. Thesingleshotawards . Blogspot. Com**

**AAV is listed under the 'Missing Moments' category. And make sure you check out the rest of the awesome one shots in the contest! Thanks Guys!**


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